Cryx

Any Cryx fans in the house?  I used some of my Patreon money to grab this Cryx army off ebay for a bargain $200.  Merci beaucoup for the support folks.  This is going to be something to use in my tutorials.

I already have a bunch of these in storage, so I don't feel uneasy converting doubles.  And lo, there shall be much converting and buggery with this little lot.

Anything you would like to see done with them, comments below!

Sunday session- Eureka!

Bosch, Bosch, Bosch, loads of Bruegel.

Some major progress on a lot of minis tonight, Walking Dead, Silver Tower, Reaper and those Eureka minis.  Here is a work in progress of the latter madness.

They are bonkers.  Allegorical characters that are extremely fun to paint.  I decided on muted colours inspired by Bruegel.

Also, remember my massive Reaper Horde I scored at PAX?  Well here is some progress.

Settling on a single consistent theme has really guven me an injection of hobby energy!

Also, ever notice placing a Tardis makes all characters look like Dr. Who characters?

My rebasing obsession

I have a problem.  You know it.  I know it.  So let's talk about it.

It's about... you know... *whispers* down there.

Bases.

My basing obsession.  For some reason, I have obsessive rebasing syndrome.

Unlike The Pixies, I never wanted to grow, grow up to be, be a debaser (debaser), debaser (debaser), but I do seem to rebase my minis a lot (a lot).

My base instincts have always been to have a consistent look and feel.  However my mind just wants to explore new things.  These two are obviously at odds.

I am doomed.

Let's look at the journey.

I kicked off well enough.  All my minis where on hex bases.  This gave them a lovely retro 80's feel, and made my figures stand out from the norm.  Hex bases where sold with Talisman and DnD minis back in the 80's.  It was a cool thing to have when everyone else was on square bases.

I used a scheme based on my fave 80's figures at the time.  Greep green followed by lime drybrushing and bestial brown edges to suggest the turf has been hacked out around the figure.

I used pva mixed with sand to build up the base- it looked great but took a while to do.  Later I found it would crumble as the pva underneath wasn't able to get air to set.  It would chip and crack.

As my collection grew the downside began to become apparent. Hexes are a tad awkward to play with in open skirmish.  They also force the model to face a certain way when you arrange them on display.  I started experimenting with other types.

Enter lipped 30mm plastic bases!  These where easy to get hold of at my local shop and gave the minis a trophy like display quality. 

See the epic quality the lipped base gives? 

The problem I had was you can't pick them up easily by the base.  It did make skirmish look cool in open ground though.

We also discovered that it was a pain playing DnD with 30mm bases on their inch grids though.  The following is my Dnd character in her early Citadel 80's form.  When all the other players used Warmahordes minis on 30 lipped bases - she seemed child like and fell over a lot in comparison.  I upgraded her to a her more epic looking Reaper minis version.  Both models are converted slightly to match.  The DM (talented Artist and teacher Epona Schweer- google them!) was running a campaign set in the frozen north.  I made my bases reflect this.

Meanwhile, I had picked up a LOT of 40k models.  Was I gonna base them on normal 25mm GW bases?  Fuck no.  I cast up my own deep lipped bases with toppers.

I couldn't make enough bases quickly enough, the fumes and cost started to get to me.  It wasn't gonna work.  So I bought resin ones.

But drilling and pinning hundreds of models onto expensive bases?  Nope.  *sigh*

I needed cheap and fast.

So I swung the other way.

You want cheap and fast, you go MDF.

The downside with MDF is all the sanding to get the edges to look good.  See?

This is what an unsanded edge looks like, and uhg... I don't love it.

I was also experimenting with flocks and mud at the time.  The results where... well, they annoyed me.  They looked dry and bland.

 I felt restless.

The next pic shows me becoming obsessed with low profile bases.  I based these ones on Aly Morrison's 80's Eavy Metal article where he was using 2p pennys before slotta bases appeared.  These are laser cut mdf.

I tried super low profile bases so I didn't have to sand them, but on heavy models these cracked too easily.  Damn.  Next.

Enter Impact! Minis 30mm bases...

Not as epic, so I found myself building up and dressing the tops a lot, and without the lip there is more area to decorate.  On some minis it just made them look lost.  

The giant here is mounted on a poker chip.  These are cheap as chips.  Literally.  This stuff writes itself.

Okay, my questionable comical genius aside- things changed again.  In very huge ways.  This was about the time I announced to you lot that I had been in transition after discovering I was intersex.

This is relevant because with the correct amount of estrogens in my system, my colour perception and relationship to colour changed.  Ever wondered why chicks dig flowers so much?  You should see intense colours like magenta on this side- it's an experience.

I wanted more subtlety and more pop all at once.  New eyes.  New me.  Time for a new look.

I shifted from greens to more earthy neautral tones for my bases.

This style indeed made my colours pop and allowed for more subtle, muted tones.  It allowed the miniature to shine more.

 I then found a lovely rich mossy blue-green which I got carried away with.  Again, colours are richer for me now, I loved the mossy dungeons this theme summoned in my mind.

Rebasing all these classic minis to 30mm plastics had one drawback- 30mm takes up a lot of room. And I have a lot of miniatures.  Placing them in scenery often doesn't work.  Okay, maybe I need to rebase some to 25mm round bevels...

Better, richer soils- this time closer together.  I wasn't in love, but it would do.

One option I hadn't tried?  Washers!

Washers where just great!  I loved them.  The weight, the stability, the speed to rebase, the cheapness and the ability to place them in dense scenery.

 Downsides?  Yeah- my display cases started to creak.  The weight adds up quickly, and paint chips off easily.

About that time Renedra came in with their range of low profile, cheap range.  I loved that I didn't have to decorate them, and I could get through a lot.  At the time they didn't make 30mm, so I went with 25mm.

Then they came out with 30m and I jumped on those.

These Cryx are mounted on Renedra 30mm bases, keeping them Warmahordes legal, but giving mine a distinct difference to most.  I liked it.

Oh. I had to base this mini in the style of AD&D battlesys.  I just had to.

Anyway, back to the game table.  Games Workshop look my advice and switched to 30mm beveled.  Only, to be pricks they made it 32mm.

So now my collection looked like every Age of Sigmar gamers.  I wanted to be smart and different dammit.

At this stage I broke up with my life partner, my computer blew up, I ended up without work, homeless and seperated from my minis.  I had to start again from scratch in a new city.

My therapist told me to get back into painting because I needed to relax.  When life snowballs so badly, hours of escape is a good thing.

I used GW bases because that's all I could get easily in small amounts.  Bulk buys where out of my budget.  Over the following year, friends donated minis and I collected cheap Bones figures to keep me distracted.  At the end of the year, I had a couple of boxes of figures in various stages.

Now I have a new job, and life is slowly returning to a place where I can at least see stable off in the distance.  I am starting to get time to assemble and paint the figures I have.  I grabbed a couple of boxed sets to enjoy.

Focusing on consistency I went to GW bases... but... 

It's not sitting right.  They are expensive, fat and not great with scenery.  I just did all these walking dead minis and I feel that it was the wrong decision.

This obsession has to stop.  I need to stop running around in little 30mm circles.

To break an obsession, I need to refocus.  I want to refocus on the minis themselves.  So I want to take away the base as a problem.  Solve my problems the best I can, let go of what I cannot fiz and just move forward.

So last night I did research and had a lot of thinky type thoughts about my obsessive behaviour, and how I can control and curb it.  This article is a child of that, and I am putting it here instead of my subscriber blog because I want everyone who faces this sort of issue to grow with me.

Here is what I came up with.  This is my solution.  What I am moving forward with.

Renedra.

I am going with low profile Renedra bases because they are llight, cheap, commonly available, stocked in Australia, easy to dress and assemble.  Work with scenery and fit the dnd grids.  They come in all the sizes I need.  They are also the same size as washers, so models that need extra weight can use those.

It's going to be Renedra and washers from here on in.

In regards to colour schemes, I decided to split the difference between all my styles and go for a muted dusty soil.  This will work for dungeons, towns, post apocalypse and future.  I can also use mosses, red washes and tufts to make different looks- but tie them all together with a consistent soil.

Here are my Uruks-as-ghouls with 30mm Renedra.  I may go with 25mm from here on in if the model fits, and 30 when it needs the room.

I am also not going to rebase models until it is painting time or they are needed for a game, just to keep my sanity.

So I am gonna try a few figures today and see how I feel.

Something akin to this... but a tad more muted.

Walking Dead Scenery and Life Update

My Post Apocalypse roll continues with the addition of the Walking Dead Scenery pack.

Look, in a fucked up kind of way I feel like I have explain my purchase to you.  Are you comfortable being my ersatz financial guilt?  Good.

So...  I popped into the store for paints only, set on filling some critical gaps in my palette- but I just had to grab these now because they fly off the shelves.  They restocked today.  I timed it well.

 I can see why they sell fast.  It's a durable kit that is going to prove itself usefull for many a game.

It's a no-brainer (geddit?).  This is gonna be a fantastic addition to my table.  Once I get through this I am tempted to grab some Reaper Bones dumpsters and shipping containers.  It's all going to be glorious.

Here are some Wizkid's Deep Cuts minis on GW 32mm bases for scale.  Oh, and BTW- it's finally good to see a product that sits between prepaints and hobbyist minis.  These are like Bones plus- sharper details, firmer material, durable and light.  Plus they come primed in VMC.  Had they had modular head swaps they would have been an 8/10 for me- also losing a point for teeny thinness which is hard to read on the gaming table and a distinct lack of personality.

On my personal life front, I will be able to tackle my email and order backlog from being homeless again and throwing myself into work for some security.  Once again, thank-you for your patience with me during this period.  All orders will be met, all shipping refunds processed and I hope everyone loves the figures- I just haven't been in a secure place.  I have a few weeks at my cousin's whilst I am house sitting which will allow me to get my photo ID updated so I can get a flat.  I have purchased a travelling wifi hub so I can securely do your orders and banking.  So that's gonna happen in the next few days.  :)

Thanks everyone!

Nothing to see here

I forgot to photograph my progress tonight, but I wanted to blog to keep track.

I got two short sessions in today, before and after clocking on for work.  It was a pretty good effort- I managed to base up and undercoat all my Walkers, and in session 2 paint all their the bases.

Since I already had a factory line set up to get the bases painted up, I threw in some of the stragging Reaper Bones, Pulp and Silver Tower figures to speed things up.

I pushed the Nova Corp minis I got at PAX a little further, as I think they would be perfect for zombie blasting action.  I painted them using Doom I marine colors at the time with this in mind.  I am old school that way.

A nice discovery is that the Project Z female survivors seem to scale nicely against the Walking Dead figures.  I may have to grab a couple of the boxed sets of zeds they make at some stage.  I feel I am on a bit of a roll with Zombie Survivor games right now.

I feel a nice sense of completion looming.

Walking Dead

My work allowed me to set up a small painting area near my desk, so I got to finally paint something.  It's been so long.

A few days ago I picked up The Walking Dead: Total War boxed set as well as a couple of the booster packs, and am absolutely delighted with them all so far. The real draw card for me was plenty of capable looking women and children figures.  Relatable apocalyse survivors that are terrified also helps lift the range over the usual snarling hero fare.

I had to jump it up my paint queue.

Tonight I managed to base, undercoat and undershade all my survivors, as well as paint their bases.

My first decision was to slice off their integrated bases and glue them all to 32mm bases.  The Integral bases are just fine, but this way I can repurpose them for other games.  I already have Reaper Nova troops begging to blast some zeds based up like this.  Rebasing was a doddle, as the material the figures are made from can easily be cut with snips.

By chance, my usual Cryx Bane Base/Kaiser craft mud puddle ocre/Tyrant Skull paint sceme actually ties into the supplied paper board nicely.  (Insert meme of baby fist pumping here- I am too tired now).

I chose to punch up the colors on the survivors so they stand out against a sea of zombies.  *cough* Sorry... walkers.  Conversely, the z....zwalkers...shit... walkers are to go the other way so they become a sea of muted greens, dark hues, dirt, poo and gore.  I sorely miss having inks to do this, so I will have to grab some before I get into Zed Action.  Nurgle green makes a perfect caucasian Zombie skin base.

As I still have a limited palette of paints, I wandered off the colours they used on their figures pretty quickly.  I don't watch the TV show and have only read one of the novels, so I don't have strong connections to any of the characters yet.  So I aimed at making my figs just stand out as individuals on the table.

The blood is Tamiya clear red.  Undisputed queen of gore.  I usually wash a black or chestnut Windsor and Newton ink over this for really deep wounds.

All in all, these figures are a joy to paint.  A nice scale, the material firm enough to accept brush work and conversions nicely.  I can see myself actually getting the whole lot, and probably a few packs of walkers (ha- didn't say the 'Z' word).

I also have a bit of Silver Tower started, so will be posting that soon.

Three geek girls you should know

Well dear reader, it's been a great weekend all up, which is something I haven't had in a while. And it's all to do with my wonderful friends.  I thought I would take a moment to talk about some of them who you may know of, but probably didn't realise they are part of my life.

Among many cool things to this weekend, I got a dedication in one of my best friends, Eva Sless, in her book "A Teenage Girls Guide to Getting Off"- an excellent sex ed guide that empowers young women to make safe, healthy and informed choices. I think this is the first time I have seen my name in a published book, and one I am proud to have contributed to.  Eva and I bonded over our mutual love of Labyrinth and Doctor Who- and we are those geek grrls who wander the streets drunkenly singing "Magic Dance" or "within you" at the top of our lungs.

 This is a pic for Gail Simone of us at Dee's Comic store in Canberra, grabbing the astounding and powerful love is love anthology.

Follow Eva's work @deliciouslybad.

Another of my friends is David Bowie impersonator and geek grrl Lauren Stardust- who is better known as the chick who started that whole filming your reaction to Starwars 8 trailer (sobbing at Starwars) and by the geek girl feminist hashtag #fuckedbyaunicorn.  I have never met anyone with a house so full of Sailor Moon and Transformers stuff!  She can also be found lurking behind the desk at Good Games in Melbourne.  This is us vlogging at Melbourne Midsumma Pride Festival. Seek her out at @laurenstardust and #fuckedbyaunicorn

Rae Johnston and I met through the video games industry.  You may know her as the queen of Wonder Woman cosplay, and the voice of video games and tech on JJJ radio, and Gizmodo, Kotaku and ABC radio.  Truth is, Rae is actually A Wonder Woman.

I am currently sculpting her Dungeons and Dragon's character for her.

Sadly she is based in Sydney, so we don't get to hang out much.  Generous with her time and always up for Magic and Tacos.

Check out her amazing stuff at https://raejohnston.com/

That's just three of the amazing geek girls in my life.  More later!

On the flip side

If you flip over your AOS bases, they are easier to pick up, gives you a wider area for decorating.  Resin pours are also easy for puddles, if that's your bag.

Another cute benefit is the model blends into the scenery a bit better when you look down on it. Behold!

I acheived this amazing feat of engineering using cork matt and superglue.

Doing it this way around also lets you sink in your integral bases- so definately a neat trick if you have a lot of DnD figures like this.

Reaper make great bases that don't have the bevel- if they release a 30mm version I am sooooo seitching to thise!

Virtuous little hours

Life is hectic. Life is complex.  Sometimes you have to grab what little hobby relief you can, albeit a little hour here, a little hour there. When you live a nomadic life like mine, it gets really hard to progress.  So each step forward must be seen as a triumph.

All that feelingy-type-bollards basically segways into me showing you a picture of my Silver Tower model progress, and yeah, pretty proud of myself for getting something done.  These are my first Age of Smegma era figures, and as a 3D artist I am loving the clever design on how they join together.  Really nifty stuff.

What really sold me on this boxed set was the Familliars.  I adore fantasy familliars, something about little quirky Boschian bastards gets my hand in my purse quicker than a really quick thing.

I have a huuuuge collection of them- from Ral Partha, Darksword, Reaper, those excellent Rackham ones and of course Jes Goodwin's Citadel masterpeices.

Though I uhm-ed and arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrred my way through the options, I decided to go with using my regular grit topped bases even though they won't sit right on the board game.  I figure I will probably use them for Skulldred anyway, so consistency is good.  Besides, the box had 'em in there already, and less faffing and more painting is my goal lately.

The urge to convert them all has been suppressed for now, but I am convinced I have a second purchase of this box so I can do craaaaazy dark things with it.  It will make for a good Twitch and youTube broadcast, don't you think?  Well, as soon as I settle into a place I can tackle that.

Another thing I managed to get done a little while ago whilst I was working on a couple of sculpting comissions, was this lovely Adeptus Astartes.  Oh, like many marines, this one happens to be female. Because geneseedy, technical reasons such as, 'women where marines in first edition- trumping all UR fluff' and... 'because I fucking said so'.  :)

This was from one of the free sprues of marines given to me by a friend recently, and the head comes from a Reaper Bones Angel.  Which, is kinda fitting, if you think about it.  I call her Sister Lucretia.  She dances with ghosts.

Finally, I started basing up a new warband to replace my display set, which is forever locked away in Sydney along with all my other posessions, well, at this rate- I just cannot raise the money to ship it :(.

I would run another gofundme but right now just finding a home is hard enough and I feel guilty for needing the last two.  Three seems like taking the piss.  Life is bitterly hard- I do have a job now for the next few months at least- that helps.

Thanks for all the love and support so far.  I hope to give you all lots of content soon :)

You can follow me on twitter @delaneykingrox if you like.  It's rather rude, and usually involves minis, Buffy, lesbian stuff and jokes.

Roadmap for Games Workshop to fix it's misogyny

Here is a quick draught of a roadmap for Games Workshop to repair the long standing problem with the 40k universe.  The erasure, segregation and devaluation of women.  It is not an article on why, it is how.  Honestly if you have to argue 'why', you need to take a good hard look in the mirror mate.

Stage 1: Retcon and move on

Going forward, include female marines as if they where not removed. Do not write a reason or justify it with new fluff.  Simply include them in new art and new fluff as if they where always there.  (After all, this worked perfectly well for Squats, Genestealer Cults, Genestealers as Tyranids, Tau, etc etc etc)

2: Sisters of Battle

Good news! No more sisters of battle codex to upkeep!  That will save you a headache. Disband the faction entirely and roll it into marine forces using the following method: 

2.1: A 'sister of battle' and 'Adeptus Sororitas' henceforth means a female space marine. A sister mini is fielded as a space marine with same stats.  They ARE marines, simple as that.

2.2: Inquisitors now requisition marines and imperial guard for missions.  The problematic loophole that they cannot have 'men' therefore use only women is removed.

2.3: The problematic Sisters Repentia are rolled into arcoflagellants as "penitants"- marines, guard and other imperium operatives of all genders who wish to make pennace or who are punished by an inquisitior to wear no armour, take combat drugs and run at enemy with hand to hand weapons.

2.4: Penitent Engines are fielded as Dreadnoughts.  Exorcists are fielded as a Whirlwind. All remaining figures are rolled into marine forces using similar parity.

2.5: Sisters of Battle armour is retconned as just another variant of the many ancient space marine armours in existence.

2.6: The fleur de lys is retconned as a symbol of women in service of the emperor, and is an optional symbol often used to denote the person in the suit is female and prefers to be addressed with female pronouns.  Nothing more.

(Sister of Battle- art by Delaney King)

3: the sisterhead sprue

This is a sprue of bare female heads and sororitas style helmets designed to fit existing space marines.  To begin, these are supplied to stockists to hand out to anyone purchasing a marine product.  Going forward, this will be included in all space marine boxes.  The sprue can also be sold as an upgrade pack for those of us wanting to convert existing purchases.

No change to body armor is needed to depict women marines (we aren't exactly major boob armour fans).  A sprue is enough.  The soritas helmets are a variant designed to tie together SOB and Marine forces.  A female marine may be honoured with one, or any of the current helmets.  A helmet halfway between soritas and regular helmets would be a nice touch to denote the blending.

The sprue can also include fleur de lys bosses that can be glued onto existing armor and weaponry.

(Statuesque minis make an excellent head sprue- but using it means women are locked out of tournaments for using non GW products. A GW equivalent would fix this.)

4: problematic material

Problematic material and novels should be revised before reprint or retired, we understand this can take several years to accomplish.  Set the mission statement now and ensure it is a step in the revision process. If you want a list of problem paragraphs and are serious about amending them, I am happy to consult with the many women gamers in our networks to compile an exhaustive list. Many hands make light work, and we WANT THIS TO WORK.

5: announcement

A white dwarf article announcing the phasing out of sisters of battle, how they are to be played going forward and introducing the head sprue.  Hell, tape it to the cover like you did with the age of sigmar giveaway.  Make a clear statement that going forward, Games Workshop values it's female fans and will continue to polish it's material over the coming years to ensure women gamers feel welcome at the gaming and painting table.  An apology would be nice, but just fixing the problem would be a great way to move forward.

That's it.  Female orks would be nice too, but start with this and you will see a massive shift in how women gamers relate to you.

In the grim dark future there is only war, your gender does not matter if you live and die to serve The Emperor.